In this month’s Fast Company there is an excellent article entitled ”Is the Tipping Point Toast?” by Clive Thompson. I’d strongly recommend that marketing executives and anyone else interested in the idea of unlearning read it.
What I like about the article is that it challenges conventional wisdom and provides further evidence that common sense can often be misleading. In short the article, which is based on the research of Duncan Watts, challenges Malcolm Gladwell’s tantalyzing idea that “mavens” and “influentials” are often the key to getting ideas or products to reach the “tipping point.”
Alas, marketing is not that simple and unless a great many marketing professionals “unlearn” their over-reliance on trying to “influence the influencers” they could end up wasting a great deal of time and money.
Interested in other posts on the topic of unlearning? Check out these articles:
Learn to Ask New Questions
Does the Pharmaceutical Industry Need to Unlearn?
Is the Health Care Industry prepared to Unlearn?
Learning to Unlearn: Case Study #1
Examples of Unexponential Thinking
Jack Uldrich is a writer, futurist, public speaker and host of jumpthecurve.net. He is the author of seven books, including Jump the Curve and The Next Big Thing is Really Small: How Nanotechnology Will Change the Future of Your Business. He is also a frequent speaker on future technology and future trends, nanotechnology, robotics, RFID, innovation, change management and executive leadership to a variety of businesses, industries and non-profit organizations and trade associations.
